Wintersday: what are your thoughts?

I have been immersing my self in the Wintersday festivities andwas curious what you all thought about this holiday event. Sound off!

Pretty loot restrictive. I know they want to bolster their Gem store, but there's really no reason to do any of the stuff more than once. On the positive side, that means I can give more time to other games I play that are also having Holiday events... especially those that are repeatable.

I think the art direction is fantastic. Opening a present solo and being surprised by princess doll the first time gave me chills. I've yet to do any of the instances. Having such a generous time frame for completion has made me complacent. I should really get moving on those now that Tixx is in Lion's arch. I'm a bit surprised that there is nothing in the Gem store that tempts me to spend cash on gems. Maybe I'm not the demographic for this particular set of cash shop items. I really hope that Anet is making enough money off this patch to justify their costs to the bean-counters. I'd like to see events this big continue for many years to come. I may buy some gems just to purchase more bank slots to help spike their Dec gem sales.

Honestly, I was a bit underwhelmed by this Holiday Event. I think they need to find some middle ground between this event and the Karka update. On one extreme, you had a very small timeframe to experience the Once-in-a-lifetime content, but very very good loot (admittedly only for the lucky few, but still, the opportunity was there). This time, there is almost no way someone will be unable to experience the content, which is nice in a lot of ways I suppose. However, the loot is extremely bland and boring, account bound, and just, well, silliness and pixels. I'm not saying they should toss out Precursors each time there is an update, but something in between the two extremes would be ideal, IMO. That said, it WAS kinda fun to experience some of the content (not a fan of the Guitar Hero type thing, I left that in under a minute, lol). I don't care for minipets, or tonics, or seasonal weapon skins which will be lame later on, so I guess the loot related to this event is my biggest gripe.

I really liked the music bell thing, tried the snowball fight a few times and gave up on it, tried the jumping puzzle a while and eventually gave up (though I think I can do it if I try a bit more). I've enjoyed the daily dungeons, including Toypocalypse. I think Toypocalypse would be better if you could go in as a group; I'm scratching my head as to why they make you pug it. Would be 500% more fun in a guild group. Overall I like it, though there's really nothing I want from the store or the vendor - I'm not a fan of the weapon skins in either location, and as usual, the chance to get something interesting from the event box is so low that I have no desire to purchase any of them. I do love the art direction, though. Logging into Lion's Arch the first time after the patch went live was magical! I am a bit sad that (as mentioned above) there's not really anything that keeps me coming back for more and more event-related stuff, as there was for the Halloween Labyrinth. Still and yet, I've enjoyed the seasonal content. And you can't beat the price!

» Edited on: 2012-12-21 09:38:17

I just did Toypocolypse and it was really fun :) Other than that I am jsut enjoying the scenery a lot.

I've got almost all the achievements now, the Bell Choir was decent once you figured it out, not really that hard. The jumping puzzle was an improvement, still interesting but not quite as challenging as the Clock Tower. The Snowball Mayhem is a lot of fun if you pick the right role, I find support is fun for grabbing presents, but its a lot more fun if you have a few guild members queue up at once and then swap around teams til your on the same one or close that way you can throw snowballs at each other and run around together :) The Tixx instance was nice, I love minipets so being able to make them easy this time was nice, since I didn't pick up the last couple sets given you had to pay gold or have random chance. I haven't done Toypocolypse but it sounds like that could have been better as far as queuing up as a group otherwise its decent I hear. The weapon skins arn't overly interesting agreed, they are still cute and I'll play with them for a bit but not keep any long term. The endless toy tonics are fun though since you can use them to do costume brawl (got a bunch of levels to the king of costume brawl achievement other day with a few guild members). I like what they are doing with the recipes now, rather than just sigils and runes they are making inscriptions and insignias too which is nice since it improves the amount of build variety, and they arn't hard to get. I like the random chance to get a mini or endless tonic from presents that's an old GW1 trick lol Overall I'm happy with it, not as fun as Dwayna vs Grenth like GW1 did for wintersday but still fun :)

Unfortuantely - as with all events scheduled around holidays - I don't have the time to partake in them - RL family first ... plus moving this last weekend has really restricted me. I still have things in boxes and bags all over the apartment. I told my children that I would do Christmas dinner as everyone was so busy they were planning sandwiches. While unpacking I have been watching Christmas movies on LMN and Lifetime - and between tears I realized Christmas is just too special a day, regardless of what you believe or how you celebrate the holidays, not to make it a special occassion with the ones you love. Sandwiches, although my son's favorite food, don't celebrate the occassion in "my" fashion. I won't say that my volunteering was a mistake but I need to cook for two days just to prepare and I was shopping for dinner yesterday for 3 hours - 2 different grocery stores - just to find everything that I put on the menu. A no red meat, half vegetarian, pleasing meal that accomodates a picky 8 year old who beleives chicken nuggets are the holy grail of food. My "Wintersday" events all involve family - I just hope to log on for a few hours tonight and maybe tomorrow - but then Sunday on ... is all family and friends until just before the New Years. So have fun for me in the game but remember to hug your loved ones - and wish them "happy holidays". They deserve the hug and so do you. If, by circumstance, you have no one close to hug... /big hug from me to you. Happy Wintersday!!!

» Edited on: 2012-12-21 11:58:39

I think the graphics are awesome and magical. I took about an hour just looking at the different cities. I find the attention to details make the game feel well designed and fun to explore. ;-) I am so happy that they made it possible for all to participate in the festivities. I missed the Karka event because I was asleep. ;-( I find all the new content fun except for the dolls. I think they are evil Chucky wannabes with the most annoying scream. ;-/ All in all I think Arenanet took all "complaints" from the Karka event and created an event that was more user friendly. ;-) As a further note...don't forget to pick up your FREE wizard hat from the fashion section @ the gem shop. It is the last item there and was surprised I found it. ;-) Happy Wintersday everyone and hope I get to adventure with you soon! ;-D

Hugs Back Morigana Chicken nuggets go some where slightly lower than rezzing naked people on my yuck list you may or may not want to read http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/jul/08/bse.foodanddrink

I enjoyed what little I did. The rewards for Tixx seem poor after the first time (u can tell that most agree as it is hard to find a group now a days).

Speaking of Wintersday directly, I liked having daily achievements and the zone was playful and fun. It was also a bit of a let down when I realized they just added a new wave or two for each night, rather than having separate areas with separate mini-bosses. I loved the jumping puzzle and Toypocolapse is a hoot. The Capture the Flag and Bell Choir mini-games were entertaining as well. I like the direction ANet is going with their events. Events should not be progression based nor a way to obtain items more powerful than what the natural progression in game provides. Instead it should provide items that are unique but equal. There were some nice drops but afaik they are replaceable by end-game tiered items and so anyone that was not able to partake in the event is not put at a disadvantage. I believe that long term success in MMOs is having enough space and freedoms to conduct social, community-focused events that bring people of varying class and levels together in a festive or excited atmosphere. In regards to holiday events it should be something that is an alternative to PvE or PvP with a heavy emphasis on social gaming with rewards that entice the players to join in. Separately I feel that expansion or content events should have elements of PvP and PvE involved but should have the extra length and large-scale community tie-ins that are necessary for everyone to at least have the opportunity to partake. Activities such as gathering goals per World or PvP kill/point totals that unlock mini-events ending in a climactic event spanning a couple of days are a great way to bring players of different gaming focuses together for a single common goal (AQ40 for example). However, they should not ignore the social aspect that keeps gamers logging in day after day. I could rant on about the current state of MMOs and how their hand-holding makes it more difficult to create and foster a healthy social community, but I digress. This was about Wintersday!

» Edited on: 2012-12-23 21:17:01

» Edited on: 2012-12-24 11:17:14

I am massively addicted to Snowball Mayhem. 1,120 Personalized Wintersday Gifts. This might be the most fun I've had online since the days of the Quake 2 Railwarz mod. I hope GW2 will feature a regular CTF PvP area with lots of "jump-puzzle terrain" in the future.